District 230 approves changes to attendance zones

Some parents protested the proposed changes

September 28, 2012|By Ashley Rueff | Tribune reporter

Orland Park resident Renee Kusper explains why she opposes a recommendation to change attendance zones between two district schools during a school board meeting Thursday. The board members voted in favor of the change. (Ashley Rueff)

School board members of Consolidated High School District 230 unanimously approved a plan to change an attendance zone between two of its schools despite impassioned protests from some district parents who said the plan is unfair.

The board Thursday passed a resolution recommended by Superintendent James Gay to end the past practice of sending students from Central Middle School in Tinley Park to Sandburg High School in Orland Park, and instead send them to Andrew High School in Tinley Park.

Without any adjustment, Gay said projections show that Sandburg would have 1,300 more students than Andrew by the 2016-17 school year. With fewer students, officials said Andrew would not be able to sustain the same curricular and co-curricular programs as the district’s two other high schools.

“We could not allow the situation to go forward without taking action,” Gay said.

While students coming from Central Middle School will be assigned to Andrew beginning next school year, the plan will include a three-year transitional period when students are allowed to choose which school to attend. Beginning with the 2016-17 year, students will attend Andrew and will not have the option to attend Sandburg. However, Gay did add a grandfather clause to his recommendation this week that allows students to still attend Sandburg if their older siblings attended the school before them.

Even with the adjustment, some parents were still upset by the school board’s decision.

Cheryl Herrin, a mother who helped collect more than 200 signatures with a petition asking the board to reconsider, said she wishes the school board would have considered offering an option zone to parents instead of mandating one school or the other.

“We’re just very disappointed,” she said.

Because the district won’t offer bus transportation for students who attend Sandburg under the grandfather clause, she still isn’t sure where her sixth-grader and third-grader will be going.

Still, board members, administrators, the president of the district’s teachers’ association as well as an Andrew student, all voiced support for the new attendance zone Thursday for the sake of preserving programs at Andrew.

“The teachers association truly appreciates your efforts to keep the students in Andrew High School in all the classes they deserve the opportunity to take, and all the extracurricular they deserve to be involved in,” said Michelle Etchason, president of the district’s teachers’ association.

Unlike his original recommendation, Gay did not ask the board Thursday to end a long-standing option zone that exists for families that live near Sandburg High School but are assigned to Stagg High School in Palos Hills.

He said ending the option would not make a large impact on the enrollment numbers between the schools and he had raised the issue in the interest of maintaining consistency across the district.